Northwestern’s Undergraduate Housing Office promises to consider cleaning habits, sleep preferences and roommate requests – as long as boys room with boys and girls with girls. Members of the Gender Protection Initiative are petitioning to take gender out of that equation for some students next year.
The petition for gender-inclusive housing went up on the Associated Student Government Web site Jan. 22. More than 400 students have signed it so far.
The proposal calls for creating a gender-inclusive floor or wing in one residence hall, adding NU to the July 2008 list of 56 universities with gender-neutral housing.
SESP junior Katherine Sloman, who signed the petition Monday, said she thinks it is time NU rethinks its policies on sexuality and gender.
“We have so many dorms on campus, so many different residential colleges,” she said. “There are so many noble steps forward, I think it’s time that you can choose housing when your gender and sex are not factors.”
When the petition has at least 800 signatures, or during the eighth week of the quarter, it will go to a university housing committee and then to the Office of Student Affairs. There are too many uncertainties to know if the proposal will become a reality next year, said Mark D’Arienzo, associate director for university housing.
“Anything is possible,” he said. “But revision of Northwestern’s current policy is not as simple as just a petition.”
But it’s a start, said Mugsie Pike, the vice president of the Gender Protection Initiative. Under the current NU policy, transgendered students are placed in housing according to their legal sex, not their day-to-day gender identity, which can cause problems, the Communication junior said.
“It can be awkward for everyone involved in the best cases, but it can also be particularly bad if you’re paired with students who are not as accepting,” she said.
When McCormick senior Mykell Miller started his freshman year at NU, he said he was “transitioning in two ways at once” – getting used to a new school and a new gender identity. Miller, born Alice, lived in a single room in an all-girl suite in Slivka Residential College for two years.
“In my housing situation, I found friendliness and acceptance but not people who wanted to talk about gender issues or be mentors to help guide me through my transition,” he said.
Weinberg junior Clay Humphrey said he would support the right for students to choose to room with someone of the opposite sex.
“I feel like people at college are old enough to make that kind of decision,” he said. “And the people who will be making that decision know more than anyone what is best for them.”
Weinberg senior Misty Gamino said she saw a potential problem in the new housing arrangement: heterosexual couples choosing to live together.
“I don’t think freshmen are mature enough to be rooming with the opposite sex,” she said.
But regardless of relationship status, housing should be about choice – not gender, Miller said.
“We are adults,” he said. “If we want to live in a room with a different-gender best friend, there should be no barriers to that.”
Miller formed the Gender Protection Initiative last year. In addition to gender-inclusive housing, the group is working towards adding gender identity and expression to the university non-discrimination policy, increasing the number of unisex bathrooms on campus, allowing preferred names to be used on class lists and training health services and University Police on gender identity.
“Our goal is to make Northwestern safe for all people regardless of gender identity or expression,” Miller said.
